Frank Distelbarth

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Frank Distelbarth (born August 30, 1928 in Löwenstein ; † October 4, 2012 in Heilbronn ) was a German publisher . From 1954 to 1998 he was managing director of the daily newspaper Heilbronner Demokratie .

Life

Frank Distelbarth grew up in the family estate in Löwenstein-Rittelhof, built by his father Paul H. Distelbarth in 1921. From 1941 to 1943 he attended the Künzelsau secondary school , from 1943 to 1946 he did an agricultural apprenticeship at the Breitenauer Hof .

Paul H. Distelbarth co-founded the daily Heilbronner Voice in March 1946 . Frank Distelbarth's older brother Hagen was originally intended to succeed his father at the top of the company. When the family received the news that Hagen Distelbarth had fallen in World War II, Frank Distelbarth took over this role.

From 1946 he attended the United High Schools in Heilbronn in the building of the Robert Mayer High School , in 1949 he graduated from high school. He then completed several years of journalistic internships and traineeships at Heilbronner Voice, Nürnberger Nachrichten , Le Monde and Le Figaro .

In 1954 he joined the management of Heilbronner Voice and from 1955 was managing director alongside Hermann Schwerdtfeger. After the death of his father in 1963, he was a publisher and managing director until 1998. In 1998 his son Tilmann followed him in these positions; Frank Distelbarth withdrew to the HSt advisory board. In 2003 he and his son acquired almost all of the remaining shares in Heilbronner Voice from the heirs of HSt co-founder Hermann Schwerdtfeger, 97.5% of which has been owned by the Distelbarth family since then.

In Distelbarth's time as a publisher, the new construction of the voice high-rise Allee 2 fell in 1957, an extension for the technology on Synagogenweg in 1969 and in 1995 the new HSt printing house Austraße 50 with modern printing technology. Under his aegis, the Eppinger Zeitung was taken over in 1972 and in 1975 the Heilbronner Voice became the third newspaper in Germany to convert to photo typesetting. In 1987 he founded the Heilbronn private radio, Radio Regional , which was incorporated into Radio Ton in 1995 .

Distelbarth held various positions in industry associations, for example he was on the board of the Association of Southwest German Newspaper Publishers (VSZV) for 31 years, of which he became an honorary member in 1999.

family

Distelbarth's father was the businessman, writer and publisher Paul H. Distelbarth (1879–1963), his mother was Hildegard Distelbarth nee. Erhardt (1887–1975). He was the couple's youngest child and had two sisters and three brothers. Two of his brothers died in World War II .

In 1958 he married Beatrice Boltho von Hohenbach (1929–1997), a niece of Elisabeth Kyber von Boltho, the wife of the writer Manfred Kyber , who last lived in Löwenstein . The marriage resulted in four children, three daughters (born 1959, 1963 and 1976) and the son Tilmann Distelbarth (born 1967), the successor of his father in the management of Heilbronner Voice.

Honorary positions

From 1968 to 1989 Distelbarth was city councilor in Löwenstein, and from 1968 to 1972 also deputy mayor.

Distelbarth was a founding member of the administrative board of the Heilbronn Protective Workshop, to which he belonged from 1967 to 1993. From 1964 to 1998 he was a member of the administrative board of the Evangelical Foundation Lichtenstern , from 1980 a member of the board, 1990 to 1998 chairman. He was also a founding member of the foundation board of the Löwenstein Lung Clinic Foundation, to which he was a member until 2009.

Awards

In 1988 Distelbarth received the Federal Cross of Merit, 1st class, for his diverse voluntary work . In the same year he also received the crown cross in gold of the Diakonisches Werk and the medal of honor of the Baden-Württemberg community council. In 1996 he was awarded the Business Medal of the State of Baden-Württemberg , and in 2003 his hometown Löwenstein made him an honorary citizen .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ red: Heilbronn voice mourns Frank Distelbarth. October 5, 2012, accessed October 5, 2012 .
  2. ↑ a b 700 years of the city of Löwenstein 1287–1987. A homeland and non-fiction book. City of Löwenstein, Löwenstein 1987, DNB 910983461 , p. 638

literature

  • Tilmann Distelbarth (ed.): The publisher Frank Distelbarth. Dedicated to the 75th birthday . Verlag Heilbronner Demokratie, Heilbronn 2003, ISBN 3-921923-21-2
  • Uwe Ralf Heer: Publisher with foresight and sensitivity . In: Heilbronn voice . October 6, 2012 ( at Stimme.de - obituary).

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Distelbarth, Frank
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German publisher
DATE OF BIRTH August 30, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Lion's Arch
DATE OF DEATH 4th October 2012
Place of death Heilbronn